Reading books twice?

[Galena]

DD is 6 and in year 2. She was reading before she started school and now has a reading age of 10.10 and a comprehension age of 10.7. She reads various books independently and has brought home all sorts of books from school - animal ark, secret seven, etc. She loves them, loves reading and understands what she reads.

The school have just bought in lots of new independent reading books - lots of the higher Oxford reading tree treetops levels, etc. She's had a few of these and enjoyed them. She reads them and then answers the comprehension questions.

We've had a note home today in her reading record asking us to make sure she reads every book twice and answers the comprehension questions. I can understand getting children who are still sounding out and developing fluency to read books twice. But a fluent, confident reader who understands what she is reading? What is the point of getting her to read a book twice? She will do it if I tell her to as she is compliant, but she wasn't impressed when I told her!

Any ideas?

My ds had high reading(decoding) age, but it didn't match his comprehension. So, if it was my ds, I think I understand. But it seems like your DD has good comprehension too, so I can't see the point of reading twice, if she comprehend everything first time she read the book.
I would definitely ask the teacher what's the purpose of doing this.
Does "read twice" means when she is doing questions, she should go back to the text again to make sure the answer is correct, rather than guessing if she is unsure? If so, it makes sense. Otherwise...I don't know.

Nope. Read the book twice. Then answer the questions. Part of me wonders if it's to stop her whizzing through too quickly. But we're quite happy to supplement with home books if she finishes their 'box'. Just seems odd.

In the book she was reading today it said something, and then a few pages later something else happened and DD said 'oh, that's why xyz....' so she's definitely understanding and retaining.

How does the teacher know if she's read it once or twice? I think I'd get a new reading book, read something else from the library, and then read the book, and answer the questions.
But then I've been known to write "read from memory" when we have been sent home a book he has clearly read at school, and while we are at a similar age, we have nowhere near the reading ago of your DD. How is she doing now?

She's doing really well if you mean physically :) So proud of her.

And she is very honest - she'd tell them she's only read it once.

My ds's school (or the reception teacher) had quite relaxed approach towards book bands. He spend 2 weeks on orange, jumped to purple, and jumped again to lime. He was allowed to read any books he liked by summer term of reception. But YR1 teacher wasn't happy about him skipping all those levels and books, she showed it clearly. Only because the reception teacher was way more experienced, she didn't do anything about it. If he was asked to read boring book twice, I'm sure he definitely lost love for reading!

Yes, sorry, Meant physically, as I recognise you from "why won't my baby sleep" sort of threads. But I name change.....
Glad she's doing well physically. Seems like she's still thriving academically.

What sort of questions is she being asked? Could she answer more deeply by re-reading? I'm just thinking if I was going to analyse a book at GCSE level I'd read it at least twice, so maybe they're aiming towards more advanced comprehension answers. But that won't work if it's just simple closed questions.
Maybe second reading could be more deconstructionist - thinking about why book is written the way it is, how author sets up the characters, how they make it exciting, use of words etc?
(Suspect more likely it's a standard year 2 edict on the assumption they didn't read fluently the first time though.)

I'd speak to the teacher one to one after school.

Honestly? I've worked in plenty of classrooms where the teacher does not want/like to acknowledge excellent readers, as it throws their entire reading diaries/assessment books right out of the window.

I would ask if she can read her own books from home. Reading is supposed to be pleasurable.

One of the statutory requirement statements for KS1 reading is to re read books..

... re-read these books to build up their fluency and confidence in word reading.

www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/335186/PRIMARY_national_curriculum_-_English_220714.pdf

Page 17

Hulababy, does re-read means read the book twice in a row?
My ds read same book twice or three times if he really liked the book, but not straight after he read it first time. He borrowed again a week or few weeks later and read it again.
"re-read these books to build up their fluency and confidence in word reading" is good for some children, but for advanced reader like OP's dc, if the purpose is just to build up "fluency and confidence", is that really necessary?

How terribly dull for her.

I was going to recommend lying, but youve said your DD will probably be honest.

In which case I'd go with a breezy and polite "no, we won't be reading it twice, thank you have a lovely weekend!!!"

What will they do, give you detention?

I say that as an ex yr2 teacher....

We are asked to re read too. I don't have an issue with it as the books aren't that long and then we read other stuff. I like the idea of really making sure they are comfortable with if - DC in top group

Irvine the statutory requirement is for children in Y2 to read books at their closely matched to current level of phonic knowledge and to re-read these to improve fluency. 😳

It's a bit of a mismatch - those publishers using book banding for decodable stop at orange books much lower than expected for Y2.

Would I expect a child who is fluently reading chapter books to immediately re-read it? Definitely not!

Thank you mrz!

The comprehension questions are in the back of the book and fairly closed - in this book the questions are 'What is Lenny's favourite food for tea? a) bananas b) apples c) pancakes', 'Does Lenny live in the countryside, town or a city?' and 'Why does Mr Cox call Lenny's team The Lions?' The first question is answered directly in the text, the third question is because they are all wearing jungle animal shorts and they all live in Lyon Street, and the second question I can't answer from reading the book! It gives the answer as a city, but it could just as easily be a town. She answered questions 1 and 3 correctly, giving both parts of the answer for question 3, and for question 2 told me it wasn't the countryside but could be either of the others.

In this book, on page 18 it says 'They went slowly back to the man selling jungle shorts. The pile on his stall had gone down a lot.' and then obviously continues the story. Then on page 25 he realises that his shorts are the same as many of his friends. DD, completely unprompted said 'Oh, that's why the man's pile of shorts had gone down so much.'

The teacher knows how well she reads and knows her comprehension is excellent.

I don't have a huge problem with getting her to read it twice, it doesn't take long, but she asked me why she needed to, and I didn't have an answer for her. They weren't asking her to read the chapter books twice, but because these books are new, she wants to read them.

She re-reads books she enjoys over and over.